r
animals.

The return journey was not completed until they had suffered many
hardships, and had more than once nearly lost the two young giraffes.

On passing through the Hottentot country, they saw many large plains
from which the grass had lately been burnt; and not a morsel could be
obtained for the subsistence of their animals. Amid the herbage charred
by the fire, they frequently saw the remains of serpents and other
reptiles, that had been scorched to death.

During the passage across these burnt tracts, the travellers suffered
much from hunger and thirst, as did also their animals. Such hardships
Groot Willem seemed not to heed. His only care was for the young
giraffes; his only fear that they might not safely reach their
destination. But each hour of the toilsome journey was cheered by the
knowledge that they were drawing nearer home; and all that was
disagreeable was endured with such patience as sprang from the prospect
of a speedy termination to their toils.

The latter part of their route lay through a part of Southern Africa,
farther to the west than any they had yet visited. They passed through
lands inhabited by certain tribes of natives, of whom they had often
heard and read, but had never seen.

Of some of the customs of those unfortunate people classed amongst that
variety of the _genus homo_ known as the "Hottentot," they one afternoon
became fully and painfully acquainted.

Beneath the shade of some stunted trees they found an aged man and a
child not more than eighteen months old. The man, who could not have
been less than seventy years of age, was totally blind; and by his side
was an empty calabash, that had evidently once contained water.

With the assistance of Swartboy, as interpreter, it was ascertained that
he had lately lost by death an only son and protector. There was no one
now to provide for his wants, and he had been carried far-away from the
home of his tribe, and left in the desert to die!

The child had lost its mother, its only parent, and had been "exposed"
to death at the same time and for the same reason,--because there was no
one to provide for it.

Both old man and infant had been thus left exposed to a death which must
certainly ensue, either by thirst, hunger, or hyenas.

This horrid custom of the Hottentots was not entirely unknown to our
adventurers. They had heard that the act, of which they now had ocular
evidence, was once common among the inhabitant